VICTORY FOR RELIGIOUS LIBERTY

Catalyst June Issue 2002

On May 16, the California Supreme Court unanimously ruled that a Catholic hospital, CHW Medical Foundation, was protected under the First Amendment for firing an employee who engaged in anti-Catholic proselytizing.

Terrence Silo, the offending employee, said he was just speaking his mind and thus asserted his First Amendment right to free speech. At stake was the autonomy of religious institutions to determine their own strictures independent of government oversight.

The court ruled that “Although there is a clear, constitutionally based state policy against religious discrimination in employment, there is also a countervailing policy rooted in the free exercise of religion clause of the First Amendment to the United States Constitution, as well as the comparable California constitutional right.”